This one was Notre Dame, a game set in 14th century Paris in which you have to gain privilege points by careful use of your influence cubes, while trying to see off the plague.
Adam, as cruel overlord of his arrondissement, allowed the pox to go largely unchecked, preferring to concentrate on using his park to gain extra privilege points. I, meanwhile, was a proto-Louis Pasteur, and I swiftly built up my hospital so I could ignore the threat of the Black Death and focus on other things.
Quentin, too, was big on health care, but he mostly hung around Notre Dame itself, trying to impress people by throwing his money around. Steve seemed unsure of his strategy and often forgot to pick up privilege points when he’d won them. Joe, however, tried a completely unexpected tactic of having hardly any influence cubes on the board at all. This left him somewhat becalmed later in the game, as his options became increasingly limited.
Controversy struck at the end of a round when it was discovered that two cards (which would be used for extra points/money/things) had been accidentally played for two turns in a row, instead of being discarded. Quentin insisted that they stay where they were since he’d been playing that round with those cards in mind, although Adam seemed keen on changing them since he didn’t like them. Joe apologised for his mistake and like gentlemen we accepted and forgave him. It will not be mentioned again.
Not often, anyway.
Final scores were:
Adam 56
Quentin 47
Andrew 44
Steve 34
Joe 30
After this a game of Blockers was suggested as a second game. It takes a minute to learn, unless you’re Steve, who wasn’t aware that points were bad until halfway through. Nevertheless his disparate squares were mostly joined together by the end of the game, and he even said he enjoyed afterwards. The other newcomer, Quentin, swore his way through the game and Adam seemed to use the fact that everyone was gunning for him to his advantage as he sashayed to another win.
Adam 4
Steve 5
Joe 6 (gets 3rd on tie-breaker)
Andrew 6
Quentin 7
And afterwards, we all struggled to put the super-slippy squares back into the right place in the box. As Joe quipped "Blockers: a minute to learn, an hour and a half to put away."
So a comprehensive double victory from Adam, and I hope Sam isn’t too upset when he gets back to the country and finds out he’s not first any more.
The leaderboard...
| Played | Points | Ratio | |
| Adam | 15 | 78 | 5.2 |
| Sam | 15 | 67 | 4.46 |
| Andrew | 17 | 63 | 3.7 |
| Joe | 12 | 46 | 3.83 |
| Hannah | 7 | 34.5 | 4.9 |
| Quentin | 7 | 28.5 | 4.07 |
| Steve | 4 | 16 | 4 |
It was inevitable!
ReplyDeleteby the way I left my phone at a mystery location in Norway so am unreachable on it. The daytime number is 0117 927 6253.
Notre Dame is not a forgiving game. If you don't pay attention to your money, influence cubes and plague level, you'll come unstuck. And I did.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't sure how much I liked it last night, but woke up this morning thinking I'd like to have another crack at it — definitely a game which would repay further investigation. Adam didn't like the fact that you're basically struggling to keep afloat rather than building a utopia overflowing with riches, though as Andrew (or was it Q?) pointed out, that's thematically pretty accurate for medieval france.
Stefan Feld's other big hit, Year of the Dragon, puts you in a similar position in ancient China; disaster avoidance, rather than accumulation of power and riches, seems to be his 'thing'.
That said, the ever-growing stack of prestige points in front of Adam was a pretty good signifier of his superiority, even if all his citizens were wandering round complaining of huge black buboes in their armpits, before throwing up blood and dying.
Blockers, or 'Fucking Cock' as Quent has chosen to rename it, was a good tense little game to finish on. I feel there are untapped strategies there — if you can scatter a few single tiles early on, they're bound to get gobbled up by others later in the game. My baseline strategy of trying to stick to a single group feels like a good one at the start, but by the end, as the options for tile placement crumble, it reveals its weakness. Thanks all for coming along, and sorry you missed it Sam . . .
I may be top, but apparently I'm never going to have a ratio of 6.5, eh Hannah?
ReplyDeleteI liked my "collect even the tiniest bits of prestige and roll around in my swanky carriage ignoring the plebs" strategy, it had an authentic feel to it... Oh, and I have to admit it was me who forgot to pick up a prestige point - not Steve.
I like Blockers a lot, but it maybe a bit mean to have it count for the leaderboard when Quentin and Steve hadn't played it before...
I actually think of the ratio as the 'true' charts - probably because way back in 2010 I actually 'won' it. But unfortunately that means I now see myself as third, not second...
ReplyDeleteYou could implement what they do at my scrabble club, by saying only people who have played sufficient amount of games qualify for the board places. Or maybe thats taking it too far :)
ReplyDeletehey everyone, this is Chris, a fellow gamer from ye olde days in Londinium who now lives in a sadly game-free zone. He'll be coming along soon for a guest spot.
ReplyDelete:D
ReplyDeleteHmm, looks like we lost a few comments when blogspot went all funny over the weekend. Anyway, hello Chris.
ReplyDelete